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As expected, the news of the 998 workers at the Presidency, not the Jubilee House has generated some controversy in the country, with some resorting to abusive words instead of dealing with the substantive issues.

It is true that the 998 figure, as compared to known ones of 692, 678 and 692 in 2005, 2013 and 2014 respectively is the highest. However, I think Ghanaians should be demanding for the figures of the other years, especially 2015 and 2016 before arriving at a fair and convincing conclusion.

The erstwhile NDC government should tell us why they disrespected the citizenry by not submitting those figures to parliament as required by law. We need to know, else all the analysis we will be doing will not be accurate lacking legs to stand on.

It is fair to raise concerns about issues of national importance such as this, but it’s equally important to examine it by being factual, honest instead of twisting the facts to achieve an unfortunate and temporal political outcome.

The questions we should be asking are, how has the government performed? Has the economic improved? What is the state of power supply in the country? How stable is the Cedi in relation to the other major currencies? What is the rate of inflation presently? What is the GDP growth rate? Are we fiscal disciplined? How is the government faring in reducing unemployment? Is the economy growing or contracting? Answers to these questions will determine whether the current number of workers at the Presidency represents a waste of resources or not.

I’m of the opinion that size is important, but performance also matters. If the government has performed within the 15 months of office, then we shouldn’t worry much about the numbers. But, most importantly, we need the numbers in 2015 and 2016. Why were we not told? Probably, the numbers were uncountable!